Menu
Most of what has been written about scoliosis was written for parents. Screening guides, brace timelines, growth charts, back-to-school checklists. If you are forty-five and your back hurts in a way it did not five years ago, very little of that speaks to you.
Atlanta Scoliosis Center treats adults. From our office in Newnan, Georgia, Dr. John Gatell provides non-surgical care for adults living with scoliosis, whether the curve has been there since adolescence or appeared later without warning. Patients travel to us from across metro Atlanta, Columbus, LaGrange and well beyond, because specialty scoliosis care is worth a drive.
The goal with an adult curve is different from the goal with a child’s curve. Understanding that difference is usually the first thing that helps.
Pediatric scoliosis care is a race against growth. Adult scoliosis care is a question of function.
Two different situations bring adults through our door, and they behave differently.
This is a curve that began during adolescence and stayed. Some patients were diagnosed as teenagers and told to watch and wait. Others never knew they had it, and only found out when an unrelated X-ray or a photograph caught the asymmetry.
The curve itself may have changed very little in twenty years. What often changes is tolerance. Discs dehydrate, muscles fatigue faster, and the compensations that were invisible at nineteen start asking for payment at forty.
This one develops in adulthood, usually after fifty, and it develops from wear rather than growth. As discs and facet joints degenerate unevenly, the spine loses symmetrical support and begins to lean and rotate.
Patients with degenerative curves tend to describe pain that is worse standing and walking, better sitting, and often accompanied by stiffness, fatigue or symptoms into the legs. They frequently mention losing height, or a waistline that no longer sits level.
A spine that has finished growing has not finished changing.
If you have already seen someone about this, there is a reasonable chance you were told one of two things: that nothing can be done, or that you should come back when it becomes bad enough for surgery.
Both answers make sense inside a surgical framework. Fusion is a significant operation with a long recovery, and no reasonable surgeon rushes an adult toward it. So the honest surgical answer to a moderate adult curve is often to monitor it.
The gap is what happens in the meantime. Waiting is not a treatment, and the years spent waiting are the years you actually have to live in. Conservative care exists to occupy that space, to address pain and posture and function now, and to give the spine better mechanics to age with.
Non-Surgical Care
Our care is non-surgical and it is built around the specific curve, not a category. Dr. Gatell holds advanced certification in CLEAR Scoliosis Correction and is a certified ScoliBrace provider.
Adult treatment usually draws on some combination of the following.
Assessment and imaging review. A full postural and structural evaluation, with imaging read specifically for curve pattern, rotation and balance rather than as a general back film.
The CLEAR protocol. A sequence of mix, fix and set, which prepares the spine and soft tissue for change, works on the curve directly, then works to hold the corrected position. Patients commonly report mild stretching discomfort early on as the body adapts.
Custom bracing. ScoliBrace is designed from a 3D body scan and shaped to guide the spine toward a mirror image of its own curve. In adults, bracing is generally used for support, postural assistance and comfort rather than for growth modification, and it is not appropriate for everyone.
Home and daily support. Prescribed exercise, and where useful, custom pain-relief pillows to support spinal position during sleep.
An adult curve is rarely an emergency, which is exactly why it gets postponed. But the years between diagnosis and any surgical conversation are not neutral years. They are the years in which posture, pain and mechanics either hold or drift.
As the population ages, degenerative scoliosis is being recognized more often and earlier, and the number of adults looking for something between watching and waiting and a fusion is going to keep growing. If you are somewhere in that middle, it is worth a conversation.
01. Consultation. We talk through your history, your symptoms and what you have already been told, and review any imaging you can bring.
02. Evaluation. A structural and postural examination specific to scoliosis, so the curve is measured and understood rather than estimated.
03. Recommendation. A clear explanation of what we found, what care would involve, roughly how long it would take, and whether we believe we can help. If we do not think we are the right fit, we will say so.
Our office is in Newnan, in Coweta County, and we see patients from across Peachtree City, Fayetteville, Senoia, Sharpsburg and Tyrone. Because specialty scoliosis care is thin on the ground, adults regularly travel further, from metro Atlanta, Columbus, LaGrange, Carrollton and across the Alabama line.
Distance is worth raising at your consultation. Visit frequency varies by care plan, and it is a fair question to ask before you commit to anything.
Yes, adult scoliosis is commonly managed without surgery. Non-surgical care focuses on pain, posture, function and slowing progression rather than on straightening the spine. Whether it suits your situation depends on your curve type, flexibility and symptoms, which is what a consultation establishes.
No. Age alone does not rule out conservative scoliosis care. Curve flexibility, bone health and general condition matter far more than the number, and degenerative scoliosis specifically tends to present after fifty.
Some do. In adults, bracing is generally used for postural support and comfort rather than to influence growth, and it is not recommended for every patient. Custom ScoliBrace design begins with a 3D body scan of your specific curve.
Look for a provider who treats scoliosis specifically rather than occasionally, who measures your curve properly instead of estimating it, and who will tell you honestly when they cannot help. Ask what the plan is aiming at, how progress will be measured, and what happens if it does not work.
Adult curves can progress, and degenerative curves frequently do, though the rate varies widely between individuals. The only reliable way to know your own trajectory is comparison over time, which is why old imaging is so useful at a first visit.
To arrange a consultation, call 678-403-2121 or book an appointment online.